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Missouri set to execute inmate convicted in 1989 kidnapping, rape, murder of Kansas City girl

Missouri Execution Ta_Edge.jpg

FILE - In this April 27, 2005 file photo provided by the Missouri Correctional offices is Michael Taylor who was sentenced to die for abducting, raping and killing a 15-year-old Kansas City girl in 1989. (AP Photo/Missouri Correctional Office, File)

ST. LOUIS -- The state of Missouri is set to execute its fourth inmate in as many months tonight.

Michael A. Taylor is set to die by lethal injection at 12:01 a.m. tonight at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic and Correctional Center in Bonne Terre, Mo. after an appeals court denied stay requests today, the St. Louis Post Dispatch reported.

Taylor was sentenced to death for kidnapping, raping and murdering 15-year-old Ann Harrison, of Kansas City, in 1989.

Taylor’s lawyers have asked for a rehearing from the full 8th Circuit, which has 11 judges, after being denied a stay by its panel of three judges today. Lawyers have also asked the Missouri Supreme Court and U.S. Supreme Court to order a stay.

The lethal drug for tonight’s execution will be provided by a new supplier after using another for the state’s other three executions.

Missouri switched to pentobarbital as a single fatal drug late last year after previously using a three-drug method. State officials told the AP there were no outward signs of distress in the last three executions.

Taylor’s lawyers and others say the drug can cause the inmate pain and suffering.

According to the AP, Ann was waiting for the school bus on the morning of March 22, 1989, when Taylor and Roderick Nunley, who was also convicted, drove past in a stolen car. One of the men jumped out and grabbed Ann and forced her into the car.

Ann was driven to the home of Nunley’s mother where she was forced into the basement and raped. The men used kitchen knives to stab the girl repeatedly as she begged for her life. Ann died about 30 minutes later.

The two men then put Ann in the trunk of the stolen car and abandoned it. The car was found three days later, and it went unsolved for about six months until a $10,000 reward led to a tip implicating Taylor and Nunley.